The UN Should Consider Lives of People in Peacekeeping Efforts

August 19, 1992

Regarding the front-page article "UN Weighs All Options as Iraq Tests Cease-Fire," July 22: I feel impelled to register a decided protest against the casual disregard of human suffering reflected in the statement increasingly being made in connection with current international strife. Typical is the statement: "The Security Council is weighing all its options, including military actions such as a possible air strike." An "air strike" is nothing but a euphemism for showering down death and destruction on hundreds or even thousands of innocent civilians.

It appears that the majority of United States citizens, having never experienced the horrors of war in their own country, fail to appreciate the full force of such a blithely mentioned option.

After decades of propaganda for peace, it is quite shocking to me, a British expatriate living in central Europe, to note the enthusiasm for warfare recently revived in the US and elsewhere. Christian Zander, Vienna, Austria The United Nations' priority

Regarding the editorials "Boutros-Ghali's Point" and "Saddam's Jujitsu," July 29: Civil war (a contradiction in terms) is a major cause of the situation in the Horn of Africa involving millions of people on the verge of starvation. Civil war has already caused a million refugees in the Balkan peninsula. Under these circumstances one may question the priorities of the United States government when it so strongly backs United Nations peace-keeping efforts in Iraq while giving only weak support to UN effort s in other areas involving so many more people. Andre DuChateau, Brookline, Mass. Zulu gangs cartoon

Jeff Danziger's cartoon July 8 of two police officers and a Zulu was offensive - and I'm no government supporter.

The cartoon seems to have been based on African National Congress (ANC) propaganda - the only thing the ANC can produce, aside from chaos and corpses. Surely it can be seen that far from being the innocent victims, the ANC is the major perpetrator of the violence. In my opinion, the ANC was directly involved in Boipatong; its exploitation of the massacres for its own ends is highly suspect.

Boipatong provided the ANC with the perfect motive for withdrawing from negotiations it never wanted, tightening the screws on the government and threatening further mass action the ANC leaders know will sink the economy. How they hope to survive if they get to power they haven't considered yet. P. A. Griffith, Johannesburg

The cartoon is not factually correct, as shown by Judge Goldstone's Commission of Inquiry, which found no evidence of police involvement in the Boipatong massacre. The police also do not drive open land rover-type vehicles where they would be sitting ducks to snipers. Neither is there a 911 emergency call number in South Africa. And people in South Africa drive right-handed vehicles not left-handed as drawn in the cartoon. W. Davidson, Richards Bay, South Africa

I consider Jeff Danziger's cartoon beneath contempt. You know very well that there is no hard evidence of the Zulu gangs murdering followers of the ANC. It is all innuendo. This cartoon can only stir up hatred. It is most unfair to the white South Africans. S. R. Atkins, Brynmawr, Wales